LOCOG last night released and sold out of 6,000 additional track & field tickets for Saturday and Sunday. Organizers said the sales effort was the latest indication that they had gotten control of the empty-seat issue that flared up during the first weekend of the Games. Since it began assessing accredited seating sections on Tuesday, LOCOG has trimmed the percentage of empty seats from 40% on Tuesday to 29% yesterday. It expects that number to fall further as athletes finish competition this weekend and begin attending events in accredited sections.

“We got our hands around this,” said LOCOG’s spokesperson Jackie Brock-Doyle. “We saw the problems over the weekend, developed a plan Monday and we’ve had fewer empty seats every day since.”